Month: March 2019

Chernobyl
BAFTA events

What yet more TV’s on at BAFTA in March? Including Chernobyl

5 March 2019 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Every Tuesday, TMINE flags up what new TV events BAFTA is holding around the UK

One new addition to the March BAFTA line-up and it’s a London event again.

TV Preview: Chernobyl

Monday, 18 March 2019 – 6:45pm
Princess Anne Theatre, 195 Piccadilly, London, W1J 9LN

A preview of the new Sky and HBO drama followed by a Q&A with actors Stellan Skarsgård, Jared Harris and Emily Watson, director Johan Renck, and writer Craig Mazin.

Based on real-life catastrophic events, Chernobyl follows the 1986 nuclear accident and the responses of the men and women whose sacrifices saved Europe from further unimaginable disaster.

The five-part mini-series is written and executive produced by Craig Mazin (The Identity Thief, The Huntsman: Winter’s War); directed by Johan Renck (Breaking Bad, Blackstar) and executive produced by Jane Featherstone (Humans, Broadchurch) for Sister Pictures, Carolyn Strauss (Game of Thrones, The Wire) for The Mighty Mint and Gabriel Silver for Sky. Johan Renck and Chris Fry (Humans, The Smoke) co-executive produce and Sanne Wohlenberg (Black Mirror, Wallander) produces.

Screening of the first two episodes of the five-part series.

Book tickets

Juda
News

No Activity, Superstore renewed; Yellowstone, Miguel, Juda, Mekimi, Siren acquired; + more

5 March 2019 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Every weekday, TMINE brings you the latest TV news from around the world

Internet TV

UK TV

  • My5 acquires: HOT (Israel)’s gay adoption drama Miguel, vampire comedy Juda, family drama Mekimi and crime drama Siren
  • Paramount acquires: Paramount (US)’s Yellowstone

US TV

US TV show casting

New US TV shows

New US TV show casting

Northern Rescue
Streaming TV

Review: Northern Rescue 1×1-1×2 (Canada: CBC Gem; UK: Netflix)

4 March 2019 Rob Buckley Post a comment

In Canada: Available on CBC Gem
In the UK: Available on Netflix

There’s something about ‘family drama’ that brings out the fantasy in writers. I don’t mean elves and Thorin sitting down and singing about gold, here. I mean implausibility, silliness and cliché.

Of course, a lot of that is true for CBC (Canada)’s shows, too, so maybe it’s the fact that Northern Rescue is a family drama co-produced by CBC and Netflix that makes it so daft.

It stars the scary doppelgänger of Alec Baldwin – his brother William, who has slowly over time converged with Alec to become almost physically and audibly identical to him – as a Boston fire fighter, husband and father of three irritating teenage children. One day, family matriarch Michelle Nolden (Burden of Truth, Saving Hope) keels over at home and is subsequently diagnosed with fourth-stage cancer. A quick flashforward later and they’re at her funeral and unsurprisingly not very happy as a family.

Then Nolden’s sister Kathleen Robertson (Boss), who still lives in the remote small town that Nolden and Baldwin grew up in together, learns that the local Search and Rescue commander is looking to retire and she has a cunning idea. What if Baldwin were to take over and bring the family up north for a new start? They could even come and live with her!

The Fates then conspire to destroy Baldwin’s hopes for career advancement in Boston and with his savings all gone from medical treatment, he decides to grab the lifeline offered to him by Robertson. After taking a secondary kicking from the Fates, who decide it would be a cracking wheeze to burn down Robertson’s home just as Baldwin and co arrive, things soon take a turn for the better. Can the whole family be ‘rescued’ by their northern relocation? And will reality as we know it survive the process?

Continue reading “Review: Northern Rescue 1×1-1×2 (Canada: CBC Gem; UK: Netflix)”

BFI Radio Times Festival 2019
BFI events

What TV’s on at the BFI in April? Including the BFI and Radio Times TV festival

4 March 2019 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

Every month, TMINE lets you know what TV the BFI will be presenting at the South Bank in London

Not totally surprising news this, but April’s BFI TV schedule is entirely focused on this year’s BFI and Radio Times TV festival. Lots to see and do already, including a preview of Summer of Rockets and chats with Joanna Lumley, Jed Mercurio and Charlie Brooker, but it’s worth remembering that the events featured here are already on sale, but more events will be added and go on sale from tomorrow for members, from March 12 for the public. There will also be a ticket buyback day on April 2.

On top of that, there’s also a two-part “Music Believed Wiped” that shows some previously lost musical material, including episodes of Cilla Black’s 1974 TV show, Cilla.

Continue reading “What TV’s on at the BFI in April? Including the BFI and Radio Times TV festival”

Edward Woodward as Callan
The Weekly Play

The Weekly Play: Callan – A Magnum For Schneider (1967)

4 March 2019 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

Just in case for some insane reason you don’t already have them on DVD, this is just a quick reminder that possibly the best TV programme ever made, Callan, is getting a very rare repeat, thanks (of course) to Talking Pictures. I think the last time it was repeated was on UK Gold in the early to mid 90s, so don’t expect it to come round again for another 20 years.

The action starts with the original Armchair Theatre production that launched it, A Magnum for Schneider, which coincidentally again is this week’s Weekly Play. It sees working class ex-spy David Callan (Edward Woodward) blackmailed by his former boss Colonel Hunter into returning to ‘the Section’, SIS’s dirty tricks department responsible for everything from extortion through to assassination. His task? The murder of the titular Schneider, a German businessman who may be more than he seems. But has Callan’s nerve gone? And if it has, will his former employers kill him?

It’s a brilliant, unshowy piece of work, with Woodward showing his star credentials from the outset. But Russell Hunter as his informant ‘Lonely’, Ronald Radd as Hunter and Peter Bowles as Callan’s posh fellow agent Meres are all stand-outs. In an era of spy escapism, Callan was a welcome bit of gritty, down at heel British drama.

After A Magnum for Schneider, Talking Pictures will continue airing the series proper with the show’s surviving black and white episodes (no, the BBC wasn’t the only broadcaster to wipe its archives from time to time), in which the marvellous Anthony Valentine took over from Bowles as Meres, and a legion of other great actors eventually took over, Number 2-style, from Radd as ‘Hunter’.

After that, we head into the colour Thames episodes, which thankfully still survive. If you miss it, you’ll be sorry!

UPDATE: Actually, checking Talking Pictures schedules, it looks like A Magnum For Schneider isn’t getting an airing, so it’s straight into the black and white episodes tonight with The Good Ones Are All Dead at 9pm. That means you should definitely watch this week’s Weekly Play!